


Lies and Sins

by Icarusdusoleil



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bucky Barnes-centric, Captain America: The First Avenger, Gen, One Shot, POV Bucky Barnes, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Violence, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-17
Updated: 2015-04-17
Packaged: 2018-03-23 11:10:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3765925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Icarusdusoleil/pseuds/Icarusdusoleil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Agent Peggy Carter asks Bucky to work behind Steve's back. Like a good soldier, Bucky follows orders. Neither of them forgive themselves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lies and Sins

“Sergeant,” Agent Carter stood in the doorway of a small office. Her expression was guarded, but she looked very sharp in her uniform, with her curled hair, and her bright red lipstick. Bucky could see exactly why Steve was so taken with her. “A word, if you please.”

Bucky glanced over his shoulder at the agents and soldiers bustling through the underground base and then looked back at Agent Carter. She stepped inside the room without waiting for him and then seated herself on the edge of a wooden desk that was too large for the office.

He tentatively followed, tugging at the bottom of his jacket. They had just returned to London from Greece, and the SSR instantly whisked them away for a debriefing. Bucky and Steve didn’t even get the chance to change out of their uniforms.

Bucky was actually looking forward to the tiny rooms that the SSR supplied for the Howling Commandos in between missions, because that meant that he could finally sleep in a real bed. But just as they had been whisked away for debriefing, they had also been given another mission. The Commandos had an hour of downtime before they shipped out again.

And now, Bucky is standing in front of Agent Carter in the small office. Her guarded expression has changed to look guilty once he closed the door. Years ago, Bucky may have made a wise crack about the small space. But that was then and this was now. Bucky changed. As much as he tried to deny it to himself and hide the difference from Steve, Bucky was no longer the carefree, wise cracking kid from Brooklyn.

So instead, Bucky stared down at Agent Carter, waiting for her to speak first. It didn’t take long before her red lips parted and she cleared her throat.

“You have orders to go to Austria and retrieve some information that was taken from us,” Agent Carter said, as if he didn’t know what the mission was. Bucky lowers his eyebrows and pursed his lips, trying to figure out what her point was. Carter continued, “That information is held in a journal by Agent Jacob Prescott.”

Bucky raised his eyebrow, “That wasn’t in the mission briefing.”

“No,” Peggy said quietly and looked over Bucky’s shoulder and out the small window of the office, “It was not. Steve cannot know about Prescott.”

_Steve_. Agent Carter and Steve were on first name basis now. Bucky liked Agent Carter. She was nice and she saw something in Steve before he got the serum. She saw the same thing that Bucky saw first. Bucky liked her—he was jealous of her and the attention that Steve gave to her—but he liked her.

He started to second guess that now.

“Why?” Bucky asked carefully.

“We have reason to believe that Prescott took the information in an attempt to sell it. And for that, he can no longer work for the SSR,” She did not look at Bucky when she spoke and her voice was just as tight as her expression. Bucky slowly crossed his arms in front of his chest in an attempt to distance himself from her.

“What do you mean?” He asked. He knew what she meant.

Agent Carter took a long breath and her gaze snapped to Bucky. “I need you to assassinate Jacob Prescott. Steve cannot know.”

Bucky tightened his lips to a straight line. They had worked with Prescott before. He was young—younger than Steve—and painfully honest. It was hard to imagine the kid running away to the baddies with vital information about the SSR. It was even harder to imagine Agent Carter telling him to kill the kid. Bucky had killed before on the battlefield and in self-defense, but this was different. This was cold-blooded murder. And Steve couldn’t know.

“No.”

“This isn’t a choice. These are orders,” Agent Carter snapped.

Bucky lowered his arms and glared down at her, “I have my orders. So does Steve. We go and retrieve the information. I didn’t hear anything about killing Agents or ex-Agents in the briefing. Colonel Philips didn’t say anything about that.”

“These orders are from Colonel Philips,” she said quickly and stood up, trying to make herself guilt-free. He could tell this was a struggle for her, but he still blamed her. The words came out of her mouth.

They stood and eyed each other. Even wearing heels, she was shorter than him. But she stood her ground.

Agent Carter broke the hostile silence, her tone defensive, “This is a delicate matter, because Prescott was one of our own men. Steve cannot know and cannot carry out this part of the mission. Whether we like it or not, Steve is a symbol.”

“And you’re sure that he actually took the information. Of his own free will,” Bucky said barely containing anger in his voice.

“I wouldn’t be standing here and talking to you if I wasn’t sure,” Agent Carter said, staring him straight in the eyes.

Bucky scuffed the heel of his left foot uncomfortably. He spoke quietly, “You’re ordering me to kill a guy who I know and have worked with. Without Steve knowing.” Bucky closed his mouth and attempted to form the words before speaking again. Carter tried to speak, but he held up his hand and continued, “Without Steve knowing… because you don’t want him to get his hands dirty. You don’t want to upset anybody by tainting their perfect, patriotic symbol. Because _he’s_ too good and you don’t want to upset him. You don’t want him to think any less of you.”

He hit the nail on the head. Agent Carter looked away.

“That’s fucked up.”

Bucky turned, grabbed the doorknob, and yanked the door open. He was halfway through the door before Carter called his name, “Bucky…”

He stopped and bristled. He backed up and closed the door before turning to face her. “Mission accepted. Because I am a soldier and I follow orders. But don’t call me Bucky. My name is James.”

With that, Bucky turned and left the small, stifling office. He strode through the underground base, his anger and fear and guilt building up like a black pit deep within him. He won’t forget the look of pure anguish that spread across Agent Carter’s face, with her full red lips turned down and her hair perfectly curled and styled. She made a mistake and for that Bucky would never forgive her.

But he would never tell Steve. He couldn’t. He made a mistake too.

And he would never forgive himself either.

 

✬

 

Bucky shot Jacob Prescott.

Bucky shot Jacob Prescott in the head at point blank range. Blood and brains splattered across his face and blue jacket and Bucky didn’t even blink. He pulled the journal, thick with vital information about the SSR, out of Prescott’s dead hands and tucked it into this pocket.

His mission was done.

Steve would never know.

 

✬

 

He reported the kill to Agent Carter after the debriefing in London. They stood in the small office and stared at each other ruefully. Neither of them could make eye-contact with Steve, but they stared at each other with a new understanding of their relationship with each other and with Steve.

Bucky and Carter both shouldered so many lies and sins, just to keep Steve up and going. They couldn’t bring him down to their level. They both loved and respected him too much, because he was just as much of a symbol of hope for them as he was for everyone else.

And they hated themselves because of it.

 

✬

 

That was not the last time Bucky and Peggy worked behind Steve’s back. That was not the last time Bucky killed for Steve, without him even knowing.

Their lies and sins kept growing.

**Author's Note:**

> I promise I love Peggy and this isn't to make her seem like a bad person. I mostly just wanted to explore the fact that both Bucky and Peggy are the darker sides of Steve's time in World War II... and that they probably both had to keep secrets from Steve, and what it must have done to them and how they felt about each other.


End file.
